Trading-Mentality

The past week has been interesting. Trump has ordered the US military to plan an invasion to seize the Panama Canal . Why? Excessive tolls on US ships, of course. Reuters provides a great explainer on the history of the Panama Canal and Trump's demands . In addition, some speculate Trump's escalating trade war (and maybe real war) threats is leading to a positive sentiment of Chinese markets . In the short run, this may lead to unpredictable volatility, especially in the western markets. On the other hand, volatility died down in the FX market last week, which I was slow to adapt. In terms of my trading performance, I returned some profits back to the market as I took on bigger positions that didn't end up winning.

The past week can be summed up with two words - tariff whiplash. The rest of the world is dealing with a "leader" who is spending more time acting like a bully on the playground.  Instead of using big boy words and clearly communicating what he wants, Trump has more commitment issues than modern dating situationships. What is he hoping to get out of these tariffs? Nobody knows. There has been a recent shift in market sentiment. This was observable through both the equity and currency markets.

CMC Markets continues to be my broker of choice. In Canada, FX and CFDs brokers are still limited, and FTMO's acquisition of Oanda is only making options scarcer. For the longest time, my preference for CMC Markets is because of the Canadian bill payment deposit option. However, there will be one more reason soon. CMC Markets is in the process of integrating with Tradingview. This integration is currently in beta, and I'm really hoping that it goes live soon.

The past week continued to be an interesting one. Trump has remained tariff-happy. While Canada and the rest of the world have some time before the next round of tariffs on March 12th, the currency markets seem to be struggling to establish a bias. The US dollar index's uptrend has come to an end. It's no longer holding above a key neckline, so I am expecting more selling pressure over the following week.

The past week has been quite a rollercoaster. Leading up to February 1st, President Donald Trump threatened all key trading partners with tariffs as part of his "America First" policy. Will this have the desired impact? That's debatable, as all major trading partners feel alienated, with 25% tariffs set to be imposed on Canada and Mexico, along with 10% on China. The Pairs in Play summarized in last week's post did not pan out as expected. However, I managed to capture a small win on USD/JPY and gained valuable learnings from my losing trades.

I've been thinking about this for a while, and in 2025, I will be experimenting with a new type of content.  I'll call it End-of-Week Updates, or Updates for short.

2024 has been a very productive year for my trading development. Although I haven't made significant gains, it has been quite educational.